Job's Web

Elpidio Pezzella
Jan 19
3 min read

"I know that my redeemer lives, and that in the end he will stand on the earth. And after my skin has been destroyed, yet in my flesh I will see God"

Job 19:25-26 NKJV

The existence that we have been graced and privileged to live is like a canvas that goes on decorating itself as the days go by and mutates over time until the final work is achieved. I wonder if the prayerful man pictured the same thing in his mind in asking God that he could learn to count his days in order to acquire a wise heart (Psalms 90:12). None of us could know the day of his birth, and likewise we are unable to know the hour when our bodies will return to the dust (Genesis 3:19). Therefore, as long as we are alive, let us not stop choosing colors responsibly, mixing them according to the best expectations and perspectives. No matter the extent of the canvas at our disposal. It will not be the temporal dimensions that will increase its value. Try with me to imagine your life as a painting. What would it be today? A self-portrait? A family portrait? A landscape, a path, a construction? Personally, I hope anything but a self-portrait, excessive self-expression that excludes the other from our scope. Unfortunately, today's society only emphasizes this type of canvas. The idea of possession and profit have acquired such an extension that we are led to believe that the other is a product to be used as long as it can be useful to us. However, the canvas (life or time) we are coloring will reflect our image, yes, but also our family and social image, our three hundred and sixty degree being.

I have read Job's story several times, trying to capture valuable brushstrokes from his existential picture. His tragic days became proverbial, and in moments of total darkness his brush drew elsewhere. In fact, one catches a healthy spiritual pride in what had been his past before the indescribable tragedy: “my heart does not reproach me for a single one of my days” (27:6). He had spent his days tinting the canvas of love, social justice, solidarity, wisdom, self-esteem, when God protected him, “when his lamp shone above my head and by his light I walked in the midst of darkness” (29:3). A time lived without regret! Then, all of a sudden, this wonderful existential picture is soiled by the drama of the death of children, economic crisis and illness. His friends, imbued with misconceptions about God's action, try to instill false guilt in him. Without transcending their religious convictions, they vehemently assert that the drama Job was experiencing is consequential to sin and therefore urge him to confess and repent. But Job, though unaware of the reason for such suffering, defends himself against this insinuating accusation, knowing that he is innocent.

In this hazy fresco of gloomy and mendacious hues, marked by God's silence, Job distances himself from the anguish and inability to grasp what he was experiencing. This is the time to familiarize himself with his own limitations, scaling the heights of wisdom. And so it is that Job's faith overflows into an act of total surrender, despite the inferences and prodding of his dearest person, his wife, and the accusations of his friends. Job's picture is ended by God's intervention, as if to put his signature: “The Lord blessed Job's last years more than his first” (42:12). If you are looking for inspiration around you, amidst suffering, sickness, dramatic social, political and economic situations of all kinds, the only answer we can give is an act of trust that transcends earthly existence. I believe it is the only attitude to fully grasp the colors of life gathered in the rainbow. Beyond the gloomy and dark tones of weeping and disappointments, we brush the colors of smiles and hope. Faith struggles against disappointment, the mockery of hope, the misunderstanding of those around you and of God's silence. Paul wrote, “For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.” (1 Corinthians 13:12).